“I think the days of Canada’s submarine fleet are over,” said Steven Staples, president of the Ottawa-based research group Rideau Institute that advocates cuts to military spending.

“If we’re going to defend ourselves or monitor other submarines, we can do that from helicopters,” Staples said. “We can do that from surface ships, from aircraft using sono-buoys. Some of our satellite technology can monitor submarines. (The) submarines we have can’t even go under the Arctic ice.”

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The Russian [nuclear] modernization program was spurred by the US withdrawal, under President George W. Bush in 2002, from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which Moscow had for four decades regarded as a central pillar of strategic stability. Moscow’s subsequent failure to reach a new agreement with the United States on missile defenses, and the collapse […]